The Recruitment of Young PhDs in the Private Sector

This paper explores the relationship between the characteristics of doctoral training and the hiring of young PhDs in the private sector in France. We used information from a national representative survey of 1,246 PhDs who graduated in 2001 and were interviewed in 2004. We focus on hiring and on the returns from doctoral training among research-based jobs and non-research jobs in the private sector. Our econometric results show that access to and wages in R&D jobs strongly depend on previous work experience during their doctorate (participation in a research contract, private funding for the PhD). In addition, we find that PhD students who expressed a preference for academia pay a wage penalty when accessing research-based jobs in the private sector.